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Authors Posts by Melissa Dehoff

Melissa Dehoff

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Melissa Dehoff is responsible for all medical rehabilitation and brain injury service issues. Ms. Dehoff attends multiple state-level meetings to advocate on behalf of members on brain injury and rehabilitation issues and is a member of the Department of Health Traumatic Brain Injury Advisory Board.

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Photo by Christina @ wocintechchat.com on Unsplash

The Office of Long-Term Living (OLTL) has announced that they will be hosting a Home and Community-Based Services (HCBS) provider call on July 18, 2024, from 2:00 pm – 3:30 pm that will include a presentation from Mercer providing an overview of the HCBS rate and wage study.

The Department of Human Services (DHS) contracts with Mercer Government Human Services consulting for actuarial services, Medicaid policy and fiscal analysis, financial monitoring, and other technical support.

Mercer will evaluate the following services categories in this rate study:

  • Adult Daily Living;
  • Residential Habilitation;
  • Personal Assistance (Agency and Participant-Directed);
  • Structured Day Habilitation; and
  • Employment and Training Services.

Because this is an HCBS Provider Call, registration for the call will be limited to providers who are enrolled with DHS to provide any of these particular services to individuals. Participant-Directed Common-Law Employers are also encouraged to attend. If you are not a provider of these services or are unable to attend the July 18 HCBS Provider Call, you are welcome to attend the July 2 Long-Term Services and Supports (LTSS) Subcommittee meeting to hear from Mercer about the HCBS Rate and Wage Study and ask questions.

Everyone is welcome to submit questions about the HCBS Rate and Wage Study electronically to OLTL in advance of the July 18 call. Questions submitted will be read during the call as time allows. Questions and Answers will be compiled into a Q&A document that will be available after the call.

A registration link for the July 18, 2024, HCBS Provider Call will be issued shortly. If you have any questions about the call itself, please contact Kristi Mundis.

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The Office of Long-Term Living (OLTL) has released a message providing advance notice of the 2024 pre-administration of the home and community-based services (HCBS) Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS) survey.

OLTL has the HCBS CAHPS survey administered to participants who receive HCBS through the Act 150 Program as well as the OBRA and the Community HealthChoices (CHC) Waiver Programs in the fall. The department then uses the responses received to assist them with improving the services participants receive. To increase response rates, OLTL is requesting Service Coordinators to begin having conversations with the HCBS participants in order to provide an introduction and encourage participation in the upcoming administration of the survey.

The HCBS CAHPS Survey will be administered from August 1, 2024, to October 31, 2024. This survey will ask questions about the services HCBS participants receive at home or in the community and how well the services meet their needs. Press Ganey, an independent firm, will conduct the survey. They will call participants to set up a time to talk. Member’s participants may also call Press Ganey toll free at 1-800-588-1659 (TTY: 711) if they would like to take the 30-minute survey. The number can also be used to make an appointment to take the survey at a time that works for them. Participants are randomly selected to participate in the survey from a list of all participants receiving HCBS through either the Act 150 Program, the OBRA Waiver, or the CHC Waiver Programs. Language Services can be provided to HCBS participants at no cost.

Members are encouraged to remind participants that their privacy is important. If they choose to participate, any information that they provide will be kept confidential. Participants will not be identified in any report that is released, and their answers will not be shared with their providers, Service Coordinator, or anyone else who assists them. It is the participant’s choice whether to participate, and their decision to participate will not affect any HCBS received through OLTL.

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The agenda for the July 2, 2024 Long-Term Services and Supports (LTSS) Subcommittee meeting has been released. Included in the agenda is the recent release of the Community HealthChoices (CHC) Waiver renewal and OBRA Waiver amendments proposed for January 2025. There will also be a discussion on the Mercer rate and wage study that will be coming up in the very near future.

As a reminder, the meeting is hybrid, held both in person and via webinar. The meeting is held in the Honors Suite, 1st floor, 333 Market Street, Harrisburg, PA 17126 from 10:00 am – 1:00 pm. The meeting information is provided below:

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The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) recently announced that payments under the Accelerated and Advance Payment (AAP) Program for the Change Healthcare/Optum Payment Disruption (CHOPD) will end on July 12, 2024.

CMS has reported that CHOPD accelerated payments totaling more than $2.55 billion have been issued to over 4,200 Medicare Part A providers, and another 4,722 CHOPD advance payments, totaling more than $717.18 million, have been issued to Part B suppliers. CMS also states that providers of services and suppliers are now successfully billing Medicare, and to date, CMS has already recovered over 96% of the CHOPD payments. After July 12, providers that are having difficulty with billing or receiving payments should contact Change Healthcare and/or their Medicare Administrative Contractor (MAC) directly.

Additional information can be found on the Healthcare and Public Health Cybersecurity Performance Goals web page.

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The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has released the June 2024 inpatient rehabilitation facility patient assessment instrument (IRF-PAI) quarterly question and answer (Q&A) document. The document is located at the bottom of the IRF-PAI web page under “downloads.” It consolidates June 2020 to June 2024 quarterly Q&A’s in order to provide all IRF providers the benefit of the clarifications to existing guidance. The Q&A’s included are based on questions received through the IRF Quality Reporting Program (QRP) help desk. A Q&A on completing IRF-PAI items for pediatric patients is included on pages 2 and 3. CMS acknowledges concerns about coding certain assessment items for pediatric patients, but instructs providers to code each item based on the guidance regardless of the patient’s age.

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Save the Date!
RCPA’s Brain Injury Committee will conduct a separate meeting with representatives from the Office of Long-Term Living (OLTL), including Deputy Secretary Juliet Marsala, Director of the Bureau of Coordinated and Integrated Services Randy Nolen, and Director for the Bureau of Policy and Communication Management Jen Hale. Representatives from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) will also be in attendance.

This meeting was originally scheduled for May 22, but had to be rescheduled. The meeting has now been scheduled for Tuesday, July 30, at RCPA’s office from 1:00 pm – 2:30 pm. While this will be a hybrid meeting, members are encouraged to attend in person, if possible.

Please send topics and/or questions to Melissa Dehoff by July 9, 2024. Registration information will be sent out shortly.

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The meeting documents from the June 5, 2024, Long-Term Services and Supports (LTSS) Subcommittee meeting are now available. These documents include the transcript and PowerPoint presentations. You can view the documents below:

The next LTSS Subcommittee meeting is scheduled for July 2, 2024, from 10:00 am – 1:00 pm, in the PA Department of Education’s Honors Suite at 333 Market St. in Harrisburg, PA. The option to participate via webinar is also available.

To participate in the meeting via webinar, please register here. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar. If you plan to participate via phone, the dial-in number is: (562) 247-8422; PIN: 919 715 035#. Comments and questions may be sent electronically.

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RCPA’s Brain Injury Committee meeting with representatives from the Office of Long-Term Living (OLTL), which was rescheduled to June 26, 2024, is unfortunately being postponed again. This postponement is due to a scheduling conflict for staff within OLTL. RCPA is currently working on finalizing a new date for this meeting and will advise members as soon as this has been scheduled.

RCPA’s regularly scheduled bi-monthly Brain Injury Committee meeting is still being held as scheduled on June 12, 2024. If you have any questions, please contact Melissa Dehoff.

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